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Hermann Hesse - Biographical

I was born in Calw in the Black Forest on
July 2, 1877. My father, a Baltic German, came from Estonia; my
mother was the daughter of a Swabian and a French Swiss. My
father's father was a doctor, my mother's father a missionary and
Indologist. My father, too, had been a missionary in India for a
short while, and my mother had spent several years of her youth
in India and had done missionary work there.

My childhood in Calw was interrupted by several years of living
in Basle (1880-86). My family had been composed of different
nationalities; to this was now added the experience of growing up
among two different peoples, in two countries with their
different dialects.

I spent most of my school years in boarding schools in
Wuerttemberg and some time in the theological seminary of the
monastery at Maulbronn. I was a good learner,
good at Latin though only fair at Greek, but I was not a very
manageable boy, and it was only with difficulty that I fitted
into the framework of a pietist education that aimed at subduing
and breaking the individual personality. From the age of twelve I
wanted to be a poet, and since there was no normal or official
road, I had a hard time deciding what to do after leaving school.
I left the seminary and grammar school, became an apprentice to a
mechanic, and at the age of nineteen I worked in book and antique
shops in Tübingen and Basle. Late in 1899 a tiny volume of
my poems appeared in print, followed by other small publications
that remained equally unnoticed, until in 1904 the novel Peter
Camenzind, written in Basle and set in Switzerland, had a
quick success. I gave up selling books, married a woman from
Basle, the mother of my sons, and moved to the country. At that
time a rural life, far from the cities and civilization, was my
aim. Since then I have always lived in the country, first, until
1912, in Gaienhofen on Lake Constance, later near Bern, and
finally in Montagnola near Lugano, where I am still living.

Soon after I settled in Switzerland in 1912, the First World War
broke out, and each year brought me more and more into conflict
with German nationalism; ever since my first shy protests against
mass suggestion and violence I have been exposed to continuous
attacks and floods of abusive letters from Germany. The hatred of
the official Germany, culminating under Hitler, was compensated
for by the following I won among the young generation that
thought in international and pacifist terms, by the friendship of
Romain Rolland, which lasted
until his death, as well as by the sympathy of men who thought
like me even in countries as remote as India and Japan. In
Germany I have been acknowledged again since the fall of Hitler,
but my works, partly suppressed by the Nazis and partly destroyed
by the war; have not yet been republished there.

In 1923, I resigned German and acquired Swiss citizenship. After
the dissolution of my first marriage I lived alone for many
years, then I married again. Faithful friends have put a house in
Montagnola at my disposal.

Until 1914 I loved to travel; I often went to Italy and once
spent a few months in India. Since then I have almost entirely
abandoned travelling, and I have not been outside of Switzerland
for over ten years.

I survived the years of the Hitler regime and the Second World
War through the eleven years of work that I spent on the
Glasperlenspiel (1943) [Magister Ludi], a novel in
two volumes. Since the completion of that long book, an eye
disease and increasing sicknesses of old age have prevented me
from engaging in larger projects.

Of the Western philosophers, I have been influenced most by
Plato, Spinoza, Schopenhauer, and Nietzsche as well as the
historian Jacob Burckhardt. But they did not influence me as much
as Indian and, later, Chinese philosophy. I have always been on
familiar and friendly terms with the fine arts, but my
relationship to music has been more intimate and fruitful. It is
found in most of my writings. My most characteristic books in my
view are the poems (collected edition, Zürich, 1942), the
stories Knulp (1915), Demian (1919),
Siddhartha (1922), Der Steppenwolf (1927)
[Steppenwolf], Narziss und Goldmund. (1930), Die
Morgenlandfahrt (1932) [The Journey to the East], and
Das Glasperlenspiel (1943) [Magister Ludi]. The
volume Gedenkblätter (1937, enlarged ed. 1962)
[Reminiscences] contains a good many autobiographical things. My
essays on political topics have recently been published in
Zürich under the title Krieg und Frieden (1946)
[War and Peace].

I ask you, gentlemen, to be contented with this very sketchy
outline; the state of my health does not permit me to be more
comprehensive.

Biographical note on Hermann
Hesse

Hermann Hesse (1877-1962) received the
Goethe Prize of Frankfurt in 1946 and the Peace Prize of the
German Booksellers in 1955. A complete edition of his works in
six volumes appeared in 1952; a seventh volume (1957) contains
essays and miscellaneous writings. Beschwörungen
(1955) [Evocations], a volume of late prose, and his
correspondence with Romain Rolland (1954) were published
separately.

This autobiography/biography was written
at the time of the award and first
published in the book series Les
Prix Nobel.
It was later edited and republished in Nobel Lectures. To cite this document, always state the source as shown above.